What does optical kerning mean?

What does optical kerning mean?

Optical kerning adjusts the spacing between adjacent characters based on their shapes. Thomas Phinney on the Extensis blog explained that Optical kerning “looks at just a couple of key instances of the base spacing in the font, and then mathematically calculates spacing for every glyph pairing in the current text.”

What is Optical kerning in Illustrator?

Optical kerning adjusts the spacing between adjacent characters based on their shapes.

How do you convert kerning to Optical?

Use optical kerning

1. Set the text insertion point between characters you want to pair kern or select the text you want to kern.
2. In the Character panel or Control panel, select Optical in the Kerning menu.

What is the difference between optical and metric kerning?

Using the ‘optical’ function, the application works out what it thinks the kerning of the font should be. Using the ‘metrics’ function, the application takes the kerning information directly from the font file so you will you use the kerning defined by the type designer.

Why do we need optical spacing?

In typography, the “look” of the typeset letters in relation to each other, which may or may not be geometrically accurate due to optical illusions caused by the proximity of various letter shapes. In good typeface design, spacing between lowercase letters is “built in.”

What are kerning pairs?

Kerning refers to the adjustment of space between two specific characters, thus the term kerning pair. Kern pairs are created to improve the spacing between two letters when the normal spacing is less than ideal. A perfect example is the spacing between a cap ‘A’ and ‘V.

Why is it called kerning?

Metal typesetting The source of the word kern is from the French word carne, meaning “projecting angle, quill of a pen”. At that time, the word kerning only referred to manufacturing the sorts with kerns, while adjusting space between letters during compositing was called inter-spacing or letter spacing.

What is the space between text called?

Vertical Spacing In print design language, the vertical space between lines of text is known as leading (pronounced to rhyme with “bedding”).

Why is kerning used?

Kerning focuses on the space between two specific characters. Although characters have various widths, it’s important to proportionally distance them. Due to different font styles and serifs, some letters may need extra kerning for words to look right. Manually adjusting the kerning gives designers more control.

Is kerning necessary?

This is especially necessary for displaying smaller and larger versions of a logo. Kerning differences are not as apparent in smaller type sizes, but in headlines and logotypes they become a lot more obvious. Sometimes it’s also necessary to have looser kerning for smaller versions of a logo.

What is difference between kerning and tracking?

While kerning refers to adjusting the spacing between letter pairs, tracking refers to the overall letter spacing in a selection of letters.

How do you know if kerning is bad?

Look at word spacing, too Sometimes if the space between words is too big, it’ll make the words themselves look too tightly kerned. The same thing happens in reverse when the words are too tightly packed, it’ll look like the kerning on each word is too loose.

How do you fix kerning?

Enable and Adjust Kerning in Word on Windows

1. Open the Font Dialog Box by clicking the arrow on the bottom right corner of the Font section of the ribbon.
2. Select the Advanced tab in the window.
3. Check the box for Kerning for fonts under Character Spacing.
4. To the right, enter the minimum point value you want to use.

What is leading and kerning?

Both kerning and leading are two fundamental ways of manipulating the spacing between characters that impact readability and legibility of type. However, kerning is the spacing between individual characters whereas leading is the vertical spacing between lines.

What is leading copy?

Leading is the spacing between the baselines of type. The term leading is derived from the practice of placing lead strips between lines type on older hand set printing presses such as a letterpress. Adjusting the leading is also a very useful way of saving or using space on a page.

What are leading letters?

Leading is an essential design aspect that determines how text is spaced vertically in lines. The leading is measured from the baseline of each line of text where the letters “sit.” Descenders, the parts of certain letters that are longer, such as a lowercase g, fall below the baseline.

What is leading in body copy?

Leading is the space between lines in a body of text. If you have any type of paragraph or anything with multiple lines of text, you have to really pay attention to the leading.

What is the best paragraph spacing?

For most text, the optimal line spacing is between 120% and 145% of the point size. Most word processors, as well as CSS, let you define line spacing as a multiple. Or you can do the math—multiply your point size by the percentage. (The text in this paragraph has line spacing of 110%.

What should my leading be?

As a rule of thumb this should be between 1–3 points more than the size of body text. If working with a wide column, increase the leading to improve readability, likewise if your type reverses out of a solid color.